a striking pair | f.c

Chapter Sixteen

Anna: Hey.

Anna: Hey.

Anna: Hey.

Anna: Hey.

OOOOOH... I DO I DO I-

Anna: No.

What?

Anna: Trigger warnings?

Ah, yes.

Trigger warnings: Basically everything traumatizing in this chapter has something to do with the Refuge, as you'd expect. Mentions of abuse, some blood... is forcing a weapon into someone's hand a trigger? Probably. I don't think there's much other than that, though? Guys idk this why I have Anna- 

And if you like to read with a bit of music, then you should definitely tap that song that I put in with the chapter, because it's my go-to love song and I love it with all my heart :)

"If ya give me tha answers I need, we won't hafta use tha whip again."

Lane stared at the whip in Snyder's belt. As much as she hated to admit it, she was starting to really fear that whip. He used it almost every time the Delancey brothers came to take her away, which was, well, every time, really. And no matter what he said beforehand, the whip was always, always used.

"Jus ask me yer stupid questions," she spat, wanting to be done with the whole ordeal as much as he did. They both didn't particularly enjoy the sight of each other's face.

It had been the same questions over and over again since she'd arrived. What's yer relationship with the newsies? Why did you join the strikes? Where's yer father's dead freaking body? Why doesn't anyone love me?

Alright, so maybe she'd made that last one up, but she liked to imagine he was thinking it.

It was strange. Even after when she'd been wrapped up in Finch's embrace, broken, sore, and bleeding, she couldn't make sense of it. It was only those types of questions he was determined to get out of her, and she was becoming less confident that she didn't have the answers.

After all, he seemed quite sure that she did.

She huffed and pulled herself away from Finch, practically crawling to the window. Every muscle, every limb ached. It was fine, though. She hadn't been planning on doing anything rash once she'd arrived there, anyway.

She just wanted to see other people living. Like they should've been.

"I didn't think dis was how I was gonna spend my seventeenth," Lane murmured, still staring out of the window.

"Seventeen?" Lane heard from behind her. "S'it yer boithday?"

"Yeah," Lane responded after a moment, and her mouth would've run dry if it hadn't already been crying from thirst. They hardly ever got any water, and she made sure that Finch always got more than she did. "I've been in he-ah fa six days. It's tha twenty second 'a August."

"Lane," Finch said, and his anxious but sure tone made her turn around. She put a hand up to her chest when she saw Finch seated on the ground with a leg propped up, face twisted into a wince, and arm extended towards her with the promise ring. "I forgot 'bout it 'til now, 'n I know it ain't tha best gift, 'n ya technically already knew about it, but..."

She slowly walked over to him, lowering herself onto the ground and taking the ring. Her ring. "I... I love it, but why? Why is it me ya wanna give dis ring ta?"

"Yer me home," Finch said softly. "Ya always will be."

Yer mine, too, she wanted to say, but the idea of making things about her when he had so clearly opened himself up to her made her sick with guilt, and so instead she said, "I guess me hair does look like a boid's nest right now."